Strike

Section 2(zk) of the Industrial Relations Code, 2020 defines strike as a cessation of work by a body of persons employed in any industry acting in combination, or a concerted refusal, or a refusal under a common understanding, of any number of persons who are or have been so employed to continue to work or to accept employment, and includes the concerted casual leave on a given day by fifty per cent or more workers employed in an industry. The first part follows the definition in the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, which the Code replaced; the mass casual leave limb is new. The counterpart for employers is lock-out under Section 2(u).

The elements are: persons employed in an industry; cessation of work or refusal to work; and combination, concert or common understanding. Individual absence is not a strike. Mass casual leave by at least half the workers on a given day is deemed a strike even if each worker applies for leave separately.

Section 62(1) prohibits any person employed in an industrial establishment from going on strike in breach of contract without giving notice within sixty days before striking, within fourteen days of giving notice, before the date specified in the notice, during conciliation proceedings and seven days after their conclusion, during proceedings before a Tribunal or National Industrial Tribunal and sixty days after, during notified arbitration proceedings and sixty days after, or while a settlement or award is in operation on the matters covered. Under the 1947 Act the notice requirement applied only to public utility services; under the Code it applies to every industrial establishment. A strike in contravention of Section 62, or continued against an order under Section 42(7), is illegal under Section 63, and Section 64 prohibits financial aid to illegal strikes.

The Supreme Court has held that the right to form associations under Article 19(1)(c) does not carry a fundamental right to strike, as in All India Bank Employees' Association v. National Industrial Tribunal (1962). In Ex-Capt. Harish Uppal v. Union of India (2002) it held that lawyers have no right to strike or boycott courts. Examiners test the fifty per cent casual leave limb, the sixty and fourteen day notice periods and the extension of notice to all establishments.